By: YESPhilly Youth
Lead Theatre Artist: Suzana Berger
Lead Photography Artist: Michael Koehler
Home can be safe, it can be a war zone, but maybe it can be whatever you make it. In this immersive multimedia project, students explore what home is and what it could be. Telling their stories with a combination of visual arts and theatre, they invite the audience to experience the complexities of home through the eyes of young Philadelphians.
Prologue
By: YESPhilly Youth
ARRINGTON: What is home to you?
MARKEITH: Home is a war zone.
LINCOLN: Home is safe!
LEONARD: Home is supposed to be safe.
MARKEITH: Home is like living in coffin without the bones. Smelling the
aroma of death everywhere.
LINCOLN: Home is where I am free to be me!
Home is where I can be myself.
SHERRIEFF: Home could be stress free and successful. But it’s not.
LEONARD: But you have to make it that way.
KARA: Home is where a family starts.
BARBARA: Home is where I can successfully raise my kids.
KAT: Home is a separation from the world.
MIKIEDA: (quietly) Home can be whatever you make it.
ALL: (louder) Home can be whatever you make it.
SHERRIEFF: Let the journey begin.
Pursuit of Happiness
By: Markeith Spencer
Home is like living inside a coffin without the bones!
Don’t tell me something I already know, this world… my home isn’t it enough that I take steps on outside of my door and hear guns clapping into the air like standing ovations but this time its last man standing. Im hearing voices… maybe dead people conflicting moans of sorrows and gasping for the flesh i have that they desire to feel greed again to feel pain as if they were never left their bodies to rot unto the asfault below 6 feet. Isn’t it enough to be that failure that wreak the halls and suffer slowly in deep depression only seeing the devils minions that surround him to weaken the mind that god gave and satan is taking away. Nah its never enough with money involved so you decide to pack the heat to say protection but to kill the man in spite of what he may do and why and never thought twice that family friends wouldn’t be the same and 2pac made that clear but naw that’s not what you wanna hear. Im sitting in this damn class looking up only to the ceiling waiting to see that if these walls wont barricade my body, slender my soul and lock me inside this prison I used to call home. Yea I said it because the only place where I thought the land of no worries exist was a bigger scam than eddy tellin me Im ready to tell your future for 1 dollar.
(sniff sniff) yall smell that it’s the eroma of gun smoke that lingered the block that contaminated my brother system until the trigger pulled and bled into the concrete I smell hate crime ignorant bastartds that never learned how to pick up books but learned to pick up tools not just any the one that goes under your waste so on your way to work the babymaom sayin don’t go until you realize that trigger could be pulled on you.
I feel… sweaty im nervous to come outside my own doorstep to walk the barriers of hell that melt my intestines to make me sick to my stomach I hear yelling… with jesus walks playing on stereos that blasted the sin out of it but inflicted sorrows that only jesus could crawl but cannot reach his children now we are stuck we are alone we are… in hell. I taste the curses that rolled my toungue and slep out my vocabulary but that kid sittin across that room 7 year old misfit that didn’t learn the hard way if you curse you gonna get hit with a belt. So I feel pain and I cannot shake the feeling that is only gonna get worse until the sun rises again ill smell hear touch taste and see the same damn things.
Where Family Starts
By: Kara Heenan
Home is where a family starts.
There are many things I sense at home. I hear a lot of things, smell a lot of things, taste a lot of things, and touch a lot of things.
I hear the TV, or my dog barking, or my mom and sisters talking.
The things I smell and taste are like fruit when my sisters are making smoothies, and they taste very bitter, yuck.
The things I touch are mostly everything, especially my phone, computer, or things in my room. I pet my dog, I get something to eat, or I do my homework.
These are the things I experience at home.
In my pictures that you use your sight to see, I showed my sisters baby in her womb. She is starting a family. You can hear, see, and feel the excitement of a new addition to a family. This is her starting her family. This is her starting her home.
It’s also important to feel safe in that home. If you don’t feel safe there, then where can you ever feel safe? Having a home where you can sense the happiness and feel comfortable is important to your well-being.
Monologue (not performed)
By: Terrell Campbell
Home could be stress free and successful. But it’s not because people don’t care about where they come from so they trash it and make it harder for others to live there, throwing trash any and everywhere tagging on walls, selling drugs at parks etc. Home could be more successful if people didn’t give up on their dreams.
Going for Mine
By: Sherrieff McCrae
Home could be stress free and successful. But it’s not. Have you felt heartbreak? I have! Seem like every time something good happen in my Life the Devil start working on me harder! I’m not worried bout doing Bad right Now I know the Best has yet to come! I’m more focused on my purpose even more now I understand even more now that power that I have to speak is stronger than I could imagine. There is some haters a.k.a. non-congratulators going change their ways. I have to pray more meditate more on GOD. I’m sorry this is me now from When I Realize I was Losing and the Devil was winning. LOL I’m back at it like I never left.
Lil L
By: Leonard Williams
We’re I live a lot off my friends ain’t make it
Including family members
Ben taken
Life crazy tha valence started way back in the 180s wen us blacks was goin thruw slavery growing up seeing things switch up it amazes me people losing jobs then go rob acting crazy b thin blam it on tha aconomie we’ll tha aconomie is not tha problem b there are no leaders but people wana follow me I’m from a hood we’re crackheads out side sleep I need a blessing I want a blessing sun shine on me even tho they gone it feel like they soul in side me.
Lil L (spelling and punctuation amended by Suzana Berger)
By: Leonard Williams
Where I live a lot of my friends ain’t make it,
Including family members
Been taken.
Life’s crazy. The violence started way back in the 80s, when us blacks was goin through slavery. Growing up seeing things switch up, it amazes me. People losing jobs, then go rob acting crazy. Be thin, blame it on the economy. Well the economy is not the problem be. There are no leaders but people wanna follow me. I’m from a ‘hood where crackheads outside sleep. I need a blessing, I want a blessing, sun shine on me. Even though they gone, it feel like they soul inside me.
Monologue
By: Katarina Backo
Home.
Home is whatever you make it.
It is yours.
Your space, your property.
It can be a separation from the world.
Wherever it is. In Philadelphia or somewhere on the other side of the world. It is where you live. It is where your family lives. It can be multiple places.
Homes are places you go a lot, know and can find.
Home is a free prison. You are arrested and free at your own home.
The bars are your responsibilities and the key to open them is your free will and wishes to live.
You are the host and the guest.
Walking in and feeling new and familiar.
Hosting yourself.
You are the seller and the buyer.
Arranging the new and getting rid of the old.
I am torn between two worlds:
Holding onto my past and finding my future.
Real Talk
By: Mikieda Lamb
M: Home
can be whatever you
make it.
K: Home can be a jungle!
M: Home can be education!
K: Home can be messy!
M: Home could be
the place you get away.
K: Home is a war zone
M: Home is where I can
Be me!!
K: Home can be emotional.
M: Home could be beautiful.
K: Home is a headache.
Home can be
misunderstood.
M: Home can have two different stories.
Which one you wanna tell?
journey2home 